On the Inspirational One.

Nicolas Welzl, riding away in his vespa.

It’s not often that you can attribute the majority of how you got to where you are at down to a single person, but for me that person has to be Nicolas Welzl.

He’s one of my closest friends during my school days in VJC, whilst we were both in the House Committee, and he was the one who opened up my mind to a life without limits.

I think growing up in Singapore you get bombarded by messages from society and the education system about how life should be led in order to be successful, but then you realise as you grow up that there actually is no such thing as the ideal life that society keeps trying to force down your throat and life is actually whatever you want to make out of it.

Nic showed me early on what it is to march to your own tune instead of desperately trying to keep pace with someone else’s music. He taught me how to view the world as it is, realising and making it perfect as it is, not distorting it to what ones idealising it to be.

And it’s funny that through the years after we left JC, we didn’t keep in close contact, maybe an occasional email here or an odd cup of coffee there. However every time we meet up we realised that even though the trajectory we’ve set ourselves when we were younger has led us through to very different places in life, we both ended up learning the same few things, that life is short, life is beautiful and that life is a chance for you to create some amazing.

We both agree how travel, not just holiday snapshot-ting to post on your facebook wall and pretend you are well traveled kind of travel, but to actually be there and see the world from a different perspective, really does wonders in opening up your hearts and minds.

So Nic, if you happen to be reading this, thank you very much for everything and keep being awesome the way you already are.

Thanks for the company and coffee, cheers buddy!